I'm still alive.

Hi, long-gone readers! It's your friendly-but-incompetent blogger here. It's been 20 days since I last blogged. Twenty. I feel thoroughly ashamed of myself.

I'm blogging in my underwear at present. Not in a saucy way, but in more of a holy-cats-it's-hot-today-and-I-refuse-to-sweat-through-another-T-shirt-especially-when-the-washing-machine-is-broken sort of way. It's only 32º (that's 90º, to those of you who work in Fahrenheit). I know that's not very hot if you're from Egypt, or India, or Oklahoma (hi, friends from Oklahoma). But it's enough to turn me into an irritable, sweaty, lethargic bore with a clammy tomato face.

Now that you have that attractive image in mind, let me proceed with the blog post.

So, I haven't done much blogging this June. This is what I have done:

• worked very hard. OK, quite hard. I'm not a miner or anything. However I have returned to work on Big Brother, which involves sitting in a grubby portacabin for nine hours a day with no natural light. So not completely dissimilar to mining.
  
• gone to three gigs: Britney Spears (free ticket, much fun), Kings Of Leon (we got told off by the woman behind us for standing up, to which Jenni replied "Do you think we're at the ballet?") and Bruce Springsteen (brilliant brilliant brilliant).
• been to the dentist for the first time in a few years. Terrifying.
  
• been to the theatre twice: Hamlet (starring Mr Jude Law. He wasn't bad... he was just a bit too... Jude Law) and Jewels, which is a Balanchine ballet and reminded me of a magical sparkly Christmas.
• been a bridesmaid for the third time. You know what they say: 'Three times a bridesmaid... obviously a loser'. It was Claire and Hywel's wedding, so let's blame them if I end up a miserable spinster. Although actually I see myself more as a jolly spinster.
  

So, to the matter at hand. I read a couple of articles the other day about what is apparently a downward trend in blogging. It seems people are abandoning their blogs left, right and centre. I don't want to be one of those undedicated bastards, but I fear I'm heading that way.

According to this article, 95% of blogs have been abandoned. One of the reasons it cites is that bloggers have moved on to Twitter, where they can express a thought quickly and get an instant response. I think that's the issue with me. I love Twitter. I use it to ask people's advice, make stupid jokes, get information, share music, see what the funny people are saying and occasionally vent my rage. It's made me lazy with the blog, which takes much more effort and provides me with much less feedback and interaction.

But I don't want to give up on hattiehattie. I feel it's part of who I am now and I'm determined not to let another month pass with only three entries. Please shout at me if I don't stick to my word. Shout gently, though.

Piling and re-piling: the secret of my success

When I was 18 and working as a barmaid in Newcastle, I once went to a party in a squat.

It had all the ideal features of a party: it started at 3am, it was full of 'cool' people, it felt vaguely dangerous, and my parents would have been horrified if they'd known I was there.

The squat was not a pleasant place. There was no furniture, only dirty bedding in the corners of the rooms. There was no electricity. Every aspect of it was manky. It wasn't a place where you wanted to touch anything or anybody.

I was reminded of that squat when I got home from work tonight and walked into my bedroom. In fact, the current state of my bedroom makes that squat look like the white, flower-filled waiting room that Mother Theresa probably sat in before they opened the gates of heaven.

I don't know why I'm such a slob. Considering I had daily "Tidy your room!" bollockings throughout my childhood and adolescence, you'd think I'd have OCD by now. In fact, I think my parents owed me that, and have let me down. Forget unconditional love and a private education - an obsessive compulsive disorder is the practical gift that just keeps giving.

But no. Their continued, shouty efforts to make me into a tidy human being failed to have any impact whatsoever. I never have any urge to put things away as soon as I receive them/take them off/get them back from the laundry. Instead, I have a highly developed filing system based around a structure you'll be familiar with: the pile. By organising letters, receipts, magazines, postcards, tickets and books into piles all over my bedroom floor, I can store them vertically instead of horizontally. This creates the psychological illusion of tidiness. It's only when the system begins to overflow, piles merging with each other, clean clothes scrumpled under dirty clothes, and I find that I'm using widely spaced stepping stones of carpet to reach my bedroom door, that something needs to be done. This something usually involves a quick sift through about 30% of the stuff, a chucking away of 80% of that, and a re-piling. Then I'm good to go for another five to six weeks.

The weird thing is, outside my flat I'm not a disorganised person. In fact, especially in my professional life, I'd say I'm a highly organised and efficient person (any friend or family member who wants to leave a sarky comment about this, on yer bike). There are never bills hidden in the piles - I pay all my bills as soon as they come in. My life is planned weeks in advance. I always have clean clothes and a fully charged phone and enough money in my bank account and all that everyday jazz. Those who haven't been to my flat probably think I'm quite a 'together' sort of person, not someone who they would imagine living in squalor. And yet, behind closed doors, I'm the kind of girl who has six dusty old glasses of water - or worse, cups of tea - positioned in random spots around her bedroom.

My room is like the portrait of Dorian Gray. The more shambolic it gets, the greater my power. Or something.

Awkward...

Hi kids. Sorry I'm late. It's been a somewhat hectic couple of weeks, with friends staying, odd work hours, preparations for Claire's WEDDING!!, and photo shoots.

Yes, you heard. Photo shoots. OK, there's been a photo shoot, and there's another one on Thursday. Neither of them are glamorous or count as real photo shoots.

Check out my new profile picture. Yes, that's me, smiling coquettishly at someone sitting on your right. On Saturday my family all had our photos taken, separately and together, at the request of my dad. Up until now we've only ever had pictures of us all looking a bit tipsy at Christmas, with party hats on, but now we have proper professional photos to put on the wall.

Getting my picture taken is not my ideal way to spend an afternoon, as I've explained before on this blog. Point a camera at me and I either grin like a moron or start awkwardly looking for the nearest exit. It's a credit to the photographer we used that only about 20% of the images feature my special trademark awkward facial expression: one eye closed, the other half open.

Then the day after tomorrow I've got to pose for some photos for a magazine I sometimes work on. They needed someone desperately and my boss emailed me saying "You will never work here again if you don't do it". So you might say she charmed me into it.

Now seems as good a time as any to point you to AwkwardFamilyPhotos.com. You've probably seen it before, but it bears looking at again. Just look at this lovely portrait, brimming with the fun and affection of family life:
It in no way reminds me of my relationship with my parents.